I took this picture as we were climbing a rather substantial hill out of Lacave on our way to Rocamadour. The hill was probably less than 300 meters, but it felt both steep and long.

August 22nd

Sarlat to Rocamadour (55.6k; 3:10hrs; 17.6 avg kph)

We had breakfast in our apartment in the Residence Saint Clar again, I got some lunch, Bill headed off to a local bike store to replace his (clipless) pedals (both of which were freezing up), and Teresa went to take some pictures of the cathedral. Bill fixed his pedals, and had a conversation with M. Balzac (our host). Both of them are pretty friendly and talkative. We left Sarlat at about noon, which was a bit late, but we'd made reservations at a hotel in Rocamadour, which was our next destination.

We rolled down the D704, which was an easy ride with a bit too much traffic, and then took the D703 east along the Dordogne to St. Julien, and then the very quiet D50 along the south bank of the Dordogne though tobacco fields, cornfields and ducks. We stopped for our usual picnic lunch (bread, cheese, fruit, chocolate, and a bit of charcuterie) in Cieurac which is more or less perched on a hill overlooking the river. Even the quiet road we were on skirts the town, so the town itself was very quiet. No shops, a beautiful private chateau which I got some partial pictures of. After lunch, we continued east and crossed the Dordogne on the N20, continuing east on the D43. We crossed the river again, going up and down a moderately sized hill through Belcastel, and coming to the bottom of a steep hill at Lacave. Here we stopped for an orangina and a toilet break before the climb. The pictures are Sue keeping her sunglasses up, the chateau in Cieurac, and a fancy restaurant on a hill above Belcastel. The climb from Lacave seemed endless. We went up the D247 with views of rolling farmland most of the time once we got out of Lacave. There was a fair amount of traffic, and the road was very steep. A van full of guys went by us yelling "Allez! Allez! Allez!" and actually gave Teresa a hand and towed her a few feet. We also got a number of shouts of "bon courage." After climbing for 4 or 5 kilometers, the road leveled out, and we coasted along the top of the causse, eventually into l'Hopitalet.

August 23rd

l'Hopitalet contains a little village, some shops and hotels, and the Chateau of Rocamadour, all on top of the plateau. The village of Rocamadour itself clings to the side of the cliff carved out by the (today small and while we were there invisible) Alzou. The Chateau is joined to Rocamadour by a series of steps and a series of chapels cascading down the cliffside. This picture (although taken when we left Rocamadour, and hence out of alphabetical order, and not very pretty) doesn't show l'Hopitalet at all, but give an idea of the layout of Rocamadour. At the top is the Chateau. The next level down is a series of chapels and church buildings. And then visible but partly obscured by trees is the town which curves along one road in the side of the cliff. The second picture is taken from our hotel window looking down the (single) road of Rocamadour. Our hotel The Hotel du Lion d'Or (we stayed in 3 hotels by this name during our trip, and could easily have stayed in more had we made it a priority) was very pleasantly situation in the heart of the fortified area on the street in Rocamadour. We checked in, and they opened up their tiny garage so we could put our bicycles away. Our rooms were very nice, with little balconies opening out onto the street (no cars, but a petit train of which more later). The most fun thing about the hotel was the elevator (actually, it was surprising that it had an elevator, but the employee who showed us to our rooms ushered us into it. The elevator could hold (just barely) two of us and two sets of panniers (I don't think there was room for the panniers on the floor). Bill and I walked down the street checking out the restaurants so we could decide whether to eat in the hotel's restaurant, or someplace else. We decided we liked the look of the hotel restaurant and its menu, so made a reservation. In the meantime, Sue napped, and Teresa rested. Teresa had not had a real night's sleep since we left the US; somehow her clock got very screwed up by the time change. We had an excellent meal in the hotel restaurant. The dining room had a glassed in terrace overlooking the valley, and we had a table by the window. Actually I should say that Sue, Bill and I had an excellent meal. Teresa seemed to have been replaced by a simulacrum that looked a lot like her, but with nothing actually inside. By the end of our usual 3 hour dinner (to quote Mario Batali's motto, "wretched excess is just barely enough") she was looking pretty peaked, and Sue prevailed on her to take some Ambien for sleep that night. After dinner, we took a walk up to the chapels. One of them had some sort of evensong service taking place, which we listened to. After the service, the celebrant began to explain some stuff about the history of Rocamadour and the chapel. Apparently this is part of his mission. Teresa (on some strange second wind) and I continued to the top of the hill and the chateau, which was of course closed as it was after 11pm by now. And the walk was a bit dark. I thought there might be a nice night view, but it was really too dark for that.

The morning began with pouring rain, lightening to drizzle. Over breakfast we determined that the weather wasn't likely to improve today, and asked the hotel if we could stay another day. The answer: yes, but we'd have to change rooms, which they were a little apologetic about (no problem for us as long as we didn't have to ride 30 miles in the rain to do it). Our new rooms were on the top floor and were not quite as nice (windows instead of little balconies) but were perfectly fine. Since it was rainy, and we weren't going to bike, we decided to walk up to the chateau (via the steps), visit the chateau, and then walk over to the tourist office in l'Hopitalet and look for a place to buy some food. We all set off, but Teresa didn't get very far before she felt a bit sick, so she retired back to the hotel. The rest of us climbed up in the rain. On reaching the top, we decided to postpone a visit to the chateau until after we did our various errands. First stop, the tourist office, which was invitingly dry and had a table to sit at and pour over information. We wanted to pick a place to make reservations the next day. Then we found a little grocery store (no such places down below in Rocamadour) and bought some food and wine for lunch, and a phone card. Then we found a copy of the Michelin green guide for the area ( Michelin's guide to Périgord-Quercy), which Sue wanted (and which we recommend - it is a fun book). All this took long enough so that we were hungy (though the rain had let up, so it was nicer now to be walking around) and we decided to bring our lunch down to the hotel and Teresa. This photo was taken from the plateau, on the walk back, before we started back down towards town. We had a nice lunch of our usual (bread, cheese, fruit, chocolate) and a good bottle of Cahors. During lunch we looked at the paper and discovered what would turn out to be the weather forecast every day for the remainder of our trip: cloudy tomorrow, with some showers, clearing the next day. (Actually, we had only one more day with real rain, but very little sun.) After lunch, we must have read and napped for a while. At one point, Bill and I took our phone card and Bill called for reservations for the next night. It took a couple of calls, but he got us someplace. Interestingly to me, although Bill's french is very good and he is very relaxed in person, on the phone he was a little nervous. Though he had no trouble at all. On the way back, we stopped in a wine shop and tasted varous things like prune wine, vin noix, vin de chataigne. We bought a bottle of the prune wine to have as aperitifs. I quite liked it though it is really very sweet and a little reminiscent of cough medicine with maraschino cherries. (It also has a nice almondy flavor which must come out of the plum pits.) We had a slightly lighter dinner than usual that night, and went to bed before it was really late. The second picture here is Sue at the far end of town from where most visitors come in.

Here are a few more pictures of Rocamadour.

August 24th

Rocamadour to Cabrerets (49k; 3:00 hrs; 16.2 avg kph)

Sunny this morning. Yeah! We packed up early (by our standards) and were almost ready to go at 10am. I mentioned you can't really buy food in a store in Rocamadour (though you can in l'Hopitalet). This isn't quite true. You can by patisserie items, and varies bits of duck and goose in cans, and cassoulet in cans. And then there is the sausage vendor. She sells little gnarled strong smelling sausages featuring meats like boar, duck and rabbit. Bill ran up and procured some just as we were about to leave. Here are some (henceforth rare) pictures of us in the sun, getting ready to leave. The first picture is a picture of the town from just uphill of the gate into town. The glassed in room in the foreground just below the center of the picture is part of the dining room of our hotel, and we ate dinner the first night precisely in the corner you can see. The view from that spot was as nice as it looks in this picture. The other pictures are probably self-explanatory.

We head out of town on the D32. This involves descending from Rocamadour to the floor of the valley. There is very little parking near Rocamadour, and very little traffic allowed into it. Many day visitors park either below, on the valley floor, or above in l'Hopitalet. There is a petit train that runs all day, and well into the night that connects Rocamadour to the parking lot below and to l'Hopitalet. It clangs its bell constantly as it proceeds through the street of Rocamadour, and stops rather noisily every hour or so until after I fell asleep outside of the Hotel Lion d'Or. Anyhow, on the way out of Rocamadour, we pass this little sign, which I guess is where the train turns around. It amused us, but maybe you had to be there.

	We had a very beautiful and hilly ride along the D32. It was pretty quiet once we got out of Rocamadour, and brought us up along the causse. Just after Carlucet, we took a diversion along D50 and joined the D677 and climbed (past blackberries which we stopped occasionally to nibble) into Labastide-Murat. Amazingly, we arrive in Labastide-Murat early enough to buy a bread, and some delicious little dessert items from the boulangerie.
	After lunch we had an amazing ride down to Cabrerets. Essentially we rode downhill the entire way, along rolling farmlands, and then eventually the Sagne (a tributary of the Célé). All of this on smooth roads about 1.5 cars wide, with very little traffic. And it was not raining. In fact, it was still sort of sunny, though getting kind of hazy.
After checking into the Hôtel Des Grottes (very pleasant, though some electrical problems), I jogged up the path to Peche Merle to get tickets for the next morning. (I don't know why so many things are like this in France. I can't actually get the tickets, I can just make reservations. I still have to come tomorrow and wait in line again to get tickets.) But I get reservations for 10am the next day, which is perfect. And the woman who sells me the tickets is polite in spite of the fact that I'm so sweaty from coming up the hill (a steep 15 minute walk) that everytime I come close enough to the counter to hear what she is saying, I drip on the counter (yes, I know. T.M.I.). The path up to Peche Merle has a really nice overlook of the village of Cabrerets (which is not spectacular, but is pretty). The picture was taken the next morning, which was foggy and a bit wet. After this, we finish our vin pruneaux, and take a walk around town. Bill calls ahead for reservations in Cajarc (our probable stopping place tomorrow), and then we head in to a nice dinner in our hotel. The heavens are starting to open up as we return to the hotel for dinner, and there is an amazing thunderstorm. We're eating outside, but under a canopy. But we have to move in from the edge to keep from getting rained on. I assume the restaurant is cooking with gas, since the power goes on and off all evening (presumably due to the thunderstorms) but the food and wine keeps coming. The power is _still_ off in the morning, even though the thunderstorms are long over by then.

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